Holding firm – PMI

53.5

-0.2

expanding

Activity in New Zealand's manufacturing sector for November experienced a similar result to the previous month, according to the latest BNZ - BusinessNZ Performance of Manufacturing Index (PMI).

The seasonally adjusted PMI for November was 53.5 (a PMI reading above 50.0 indicates that manufacturing is generally expanding; below 50.0 that it is declining). Although this was 0.2 points lower than October, it remained just above the long-term average of 53.4 for the survey.

BusinessNZ's executive director for manufacturing Catherine Beard said that it was pleasing to see activity in November remain close to the October result.

"With two of the three months for the last quarter on 2018 producing results around the long-term average, this bodes well for the year to end on more of a positive note after lacklustre results during the middle of 2018.

In addition, the proportion of positive comments for November (60.1%) improved from October (58.3%). Seasonal factors were obviously a major discussion point, although a number pointed to increased general customer demand and sales".

BNZ Senior Economist, Craig Ebert said that "the improvement in the PMI since July has been underpinned by a pick-up in new orders, which achieved 56.3 in November. This level is usually a good portent that production will expand relatively well in the near term".

Main Indicies

Regional Results

The PMI

Through November, the Performance of Manufacturing Index (PMI) consolidated its recently-improved pace. That’s not to say it’s strong. Indeed, at a seasonally adjusted 53.5, from 53.7 in October, the PMI is simply running more surely about average. Nonetheless, it’s a little better than it was back in July, when it plumbed 51.3.Read more

Production/Sales

For the meantime, however, the production component of the PMI has been expanding on the slow side of average. In fact, it dipped to a seasonally adjusted 51.5 in November, from 52.9 in October.Read more

GDP/Exports

As for what Statistics NZ comes up with, with respect to NZ manufacturing output, all will be revealed in next week’s Q3 GDP accounts. For these we are assuming a relatively flat outcome for manufacturing, but a 0.6% expansion in GDP overall.Read more

Pricing

However, trends in manufacturing pricing were relatively strong in Q3. With respect to output (selling) prices, the latest producer price indexes registered a 2.9% quarterly increase for the industry.Read more